And I hate the pick only because it now actually forces me to vote. I was quite happy with my 'fuck it who cares they're all fucking terrible' stance. Now someone has come out and become terrible-er. Good job.

I can't believe what I'm reading in this forum: Liberals hating the Ryan pick. I'm SHOCKED I tell you. SHOCKED.

My campaign raised a lot of money today off this pick. I was really afraid that Romney would make a sensible pick of someone clearly qualified but inoffensive: a Portman, Daniels of Pawlenty. This made my day.

This will no doubt consolidate Romney's base and give him a nice bump going into the Convention. But in terms of election narrative, Romney can't avoid a clear debate between "cut taxes for the rich and slash social spending" versus "raise taxes on the rich and cut spending up and down the budget" approaches to balance the budget. That's not a policy fight where a majority of Americans are on his side.

Fireball, don't pretend that VP picks have much influence over the general election beyond either deflating or firing up the base. They simply don't. I can back that up with statistics from fivethirtyeight.

What this pick has done is gathered in the Republican base and nothing more. He could have picked superman and it would have had little effect on non-republicans.

I can't believe what I'm reading in this forum: Liberals hating the Ryan pick. I'm SHOCKED I tell you. SHOCKED.

Odd. Most liberals (including myself) seem very pleased with this pick.

Yeah, there are many running mates Romney could have chosen to better emphasize the mainline craziness of the modern Conservative movements (Bachmann, Cain, West, King, Palin, etc.), but precious few that could have exemplified their regressive Social Darwinism so thoroughly. The wealthiest Americans, who are making more money and paying a lower percentage of it to taxes than at almost any point in the 20th Century, still don't have enough, so the country needs offset even lower taxes by slashing medical funding for poor, old, and disabled people.

Funny how you spit the term "lower taxes" out of your mouth with such disgust. It's a crime to you for government to take in less money and spend less? Is it grotesque to you to have people keep more of the money they earn?

Fireball, don't pretend that VP picks have much influence over the general election beyond either deflating or firing up the base. They simply don't.

Most VP picks have not spent years pushing legislation explicitly designed to unravel hugely popular strands of our social safety net. Medicare guarantees health insurance to people the private sector is the least incentivized to cover, vastly improving the quality of life for the elderly by subsidizing medical benefits they are very likely to need and otherwise couldn't afford. Americans really like the idea of a society that provides for its retirees, including all those silver-haired folks you see puttering around the local Tea Party rally in their motorized scooters.

Mitt Romney will probably see a nice popularity bump from picking Paul Ryan, especially among his base. It will be interesting to see how that evolves as the conversation turns to what his budget proposals would actually mean for the average voter.

Ryan himself will not cost Romney votes, but he makes it harder for Romney to avoid problematic topics like the recent efforts of Republicans to dismantle medicare.

The people for whom this is a *disaster* are Republican Congressional candidates in marginal districts. They had been trying like mad to not talk about Medicare. Guess what just became topic number two in the election?

Previously, Romney's strategy was to avoid specifics and keep sniping at Obama on the economy while positioning himself as the nebulous alternative. The idea was to run out the clock while trying to damage the president in any way possible, without getting pinned down on specifics.

That wasn't working; polls were gradually drifting in Obama's direction. Now Romney is suddenly no longer the enigmatic anti-Obama. His future is bound up with his running mate's economic policy and his party's extreme right. The whole complexion of the race has changed.

I'd say that's rather a lot of influence over the election for a vp candidate to have.

Fireball, don't pretend that VP picks have much influence over the general election beyond either deflating or firing up the base. They simply don't.

Most VP picks have not spent years pushing legislation explicitly designed to unravel hugely popular strands of our social safety net. Medicare guarantees health insurance to people the private sector is the least incentivized to cover, vastly improving the quality of life for the elderly by subsidizing medical benefits they are very likely to need and otherwise couldn't afford. Americans really like the idea of a society that provides for its retirees, including all those silver-haired folks you see puttering around the local Tea Party rally in their motorized scooters.

Mitt Romney will probably see a nice popularity bump from picking Paul Ryan, especially among his base. It will be interesting to see how that evolves as the conversation turns to what his budget proposals would actually mean for the average voter.

-Autistic Angel

The only thing I don't understand is where the hell the money is going to come from to continue this great safety net. Liberal, conservative, republican or democrat it's there in black and white that we're out of the damn money to keep things going. If voters don't understand that things have to be cut (unpopular cuts on both sides) to prevent a total loss then frankly you probably shouldn't even be allowed to vote because at that point you're part of the problem and not the solution. We're in a crisis that could lead to a total collapse and things have to be done right now. Not two more years, not four more years, not in a decade.

Social security is already done...the minute congress was allowed to spend the money (they'll pay it back with interest right ) it was dead and waiting to be buried. Welfare needs extreme reform and honestly Medicare (in some form) is here to stay because the Republican's won't jeopardize their elderly base for any reason.

Ryan was a decent choice and far better than most of the other choices out there right now. Personally I don't agree with him on a LOT of different issues but he's no Palin. The next four years are going to be budget, money and the economy and he's a smaller govt, trim the edges, make a budget pick.

In the end does it really even matter. How much influence has any recent VP had in any real way after the election. Can you name one substantial thing Biden has done (besides put his entire foot in his mouth at times)? How about Cheney (no gun jokes now ) or Quayle? You might be able to make a case with the first Bush or Gore but it's slim at best even then.

For a presidential candidate its best if his VP isnt controversial in any way. Its hard to find any VP candidate who has a positive voting effect, the best you can hope for is that they are neutral in their effect. The problem is avoiding a vp candidate that has a detrimental effect ( see Sarah Palin ). Ryan will help stabilize the conservative position for Romney but he is definitely polarizing and will likely cost Romney some "on the fence" votes. Its going to be interesting to see how much effect he has. I think its a good pick for Romney, especially with his record of flip flopping on issues. This kind of draws the line in the sand as to where this republican ticket stands. Strap in boys, it looks like we got a class war brewin!

<sarcasm>Well, if the basic idea is to cut government services, I'd start by cutting the national guard. When was the last time we really had to worry about mobilizing on our own soil. We've got police forces with MP5s, etc. Why do we need to pay them? Second, I'd cut funding to military bases that have been unpopular to our image. Base on Japan, closed. Let's close a bunch of bases in Europe as well. They've got a modern military, they certainly don't need us there anymore. I mean, we're pretty xenophobic to begin with, let's go with it. Isolationism, FTW. Finally, considering the negative view of government research the right has, let's cut funding to DARPA. If NASA doesn't need money, neither does DARPA. Private enterprise will take care of all of it. Actually, yes, if we've privatized the prisons, let's just further privatize the military. While talking about defense spending, we should slash interstate maintenance funding. Considering it's historical roots, it's basically military spending.</sarcasm>

Or, realistically, you could keep the current marginal tax rate and increase the effective tax rate on the top 1% of earners while keeping the taxes low on the other 99% and call it a day. I suggest the Reagan ideas of closing tax loopholes and taxing capital gains at the same rate as income. Or we could just continue to deficit spend like Reagan and Bush...

On some level, taxes have to increase. Our basic infrastructure needs investment. This money isn't coming from private enterprise, nor will it ever. We can't slash and burn all of the spending in the government without completely crashing our economy. Components of the economy don't work in a vacuum.

Here's an active-duty general proposing that we cut the nuclear stockpile -- weapons in reserve, not deployed -- from 2,800 warheads to 900. The article doesn't estimate the savings other than to say

Quote

On average, the weapons  the US military maintains seven types of nuclear warheads  are several decades old and require upgrades to ensure their reliability and safety. Additional measures are taken to ensure they are not vulnerable to sabotage or theft.

We can save money and logistics costs if we could get at the reserve, said Jon Wolfsthal, who until last spring served as a top adviser to Vice President Joe Biden on arms control and nonproliferation.

In principle, I like the idea of the United States maintaining military bases in countries like Japan and Germany and Italy because it greatly facilitates operations like relief efforts to natural disasters. When Conservative fiscal policies force an artificial choice between helping some people, sporadically, at unpredictable moments in the future, or helping the neediest Americans get life-saving medical services right now, I'd have to defer to the latter.

There are other Defense spending adjustments I'd recommend, like not awarding lucrative helmet contracts to companies under federal investigation for knowingly underwearing military kevlar, or not spending billions of dollars on cool pixel-based camouflage that doesn't work. The projects themselves might be drops in the bucket, but once you factor in all the lives and limbs they've cost, things like survivor benefits and rehabilitation expenditures add up.

Now I have a question. Examination of the very-limited information we have about Mitt Romney's taxes show that if Paul Ryan's budget were adopted, his tax rate would drop from 13.9% to 0.82%. It's effectively the same supply-side economic theory that has famously failed to produce results for the poor and middle class for ten years now, combined with the same sort of austerity measures that have produced such catastrophic results across Europe in the last few years. By comparison, the top marginal tax rate in the United States was upwards of 70% from 1936 through 1982, and instead of the broad-spectrum Randian capitalist collapse Conservatives tell us that tax hikes should inspire, the country built its way out of the Great Depression to become a global superpower and the envy of the industrialized world.

When all the evidence points to the fact that the Romney / Ryan budget will take from the poor, give to the rich, and fuel a pro-cyclical economic spiral by pursuing thoroughly discredited economic theories, why should average Americans support it?

When all the evidence points to the fact that the Romney / Ryan budget will take from the poor, give to the rich, and fuel a pro-cyclical economic spiral by pursuing thoroughly discredited economic theories, why should average Americans support it?

Previously, Romney'sObama's strategy was to avoid specifics and keep sniping at ObamaBush on the economy while positioning himself as the nebulous alternative. The idea was to run out the clock while trying to damage the president in any way possible, without getting pinned down on specifics.

Previously, Romney'sObama's strategy was to avoid specifics and keep sniping at ObamaBush on the economy while positioning himself as the nebulous alternative. The idea was to run out the clock while trying to damage the president in any way possible, without getting pinned down on specifics.

Funny how that works. Hope and Change and All That.

Specific economic policy proposals made by or openly supported by Barack Obama leading up to the 2008 election included ending the Bush Tax Cuts for people bringing home over $250,000 a year; restoring PAYGO rules for Congress; establishing a 90-day moratorium on foreclosures for mortgage holders making a good-faith attempt to refinance and stay current on their payments; protecting Net Neutrality; closing gender-based discrimination loopholes in the Equal Pay Act; increasing penalties on businesses for violations of environmental and labor laws; introducing a $3,000 tax credit for each new full-time employee hired above their current work force; doubling Congress' guaranteed loans to the American auto industry; adding the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to the regular budget; and, of course, reforming the health care system to provide coverage for pre-existing conditions and eliminate the practice of rescission.

Previously, Romney'sObama's strategy was to avoid specifics and keep sniping at ObamaBush on the economy while positioning himself as the nebulous alternative. The idea was to run out the clock while trying to damage the president in any way possible, without getting pinned down on specifics.

A few facts I did not know about Paul Ryan prior to his vice presidential bid:

- He accepted years of Social Security survivor benefits to help cover his tuition at a federally subsidized college, and nearly his entire adult life has been spent in politics.

- First elected to the House of Representatives in 1998, Ryan spent the 2000's casting straight party-line votes for every single one of George W. Bush's deficit-exploding ideas. The unpaid for tax cuts, the off-books wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Medicare Part-D expansion -- all of it.

- The deepest specified spending cuts in Paul Ryan's budget do not come from the elimination of Medicare, but from Medicaid programs providing critical health care to the poorest Americans. Even these cuts would be nowhere near enough to cover the massive tax cuts he wants for the wealthy, so the vast majority of his "deficit shrinking" budget calls for cuts in "hundreds" of unspecified government programs and agencies.

- Paul Ryan co-sponsored a national "Personhood" law called the "Sanctity of Life Act" which would outlaw all abortions, including in cases of rape and incest; in vitro fertilization, and many forms of birth control.

- He voted against the Lilly Ledbetter Act giving women legal recourse in the event of gender-based pay discrimination.

- Ryan supports a constitutional ban on gay marriage, opposed the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, voted against the Hate Crimes Prevention Act, and would forbid gay couples from adopting. He also supports a constitutional amendment to outlaw flag burning.

What a guy.

Quote from: Autistic Angel on August 13, 2012, 05:59:12 PM

Now I have a question. Examination of the very-limited information we have about Mitt Romney's taxes show that if Paul Ryan's budget were adopted, his tax rate would drop from 13.9% to 0.82%. It's effectively the same supply-side economic theory that has famously failed to produce results for the poor and middle class for ten years now, combined with the same sort of austerity measures that have produced such catastrophic results across Europe in the last few years. By comparison, the top marginal tax rate in the United States was upwards of 70% from 1936 through 1982, and instead of the broad-spectrum Randian capitalist collapse Conservatives tell us that tax hikes should inspire, the country built its way out of the Great Depression to become a global superpower and the envy of the industrialized world.

When all the evidence points to the fact that the Romney / Ryan budget will take from the poor, give to the rich, and fuel a pro-cyclical economic spiral by pursuing thoroughly discredited economic theories, why should average Americans support it?

This was not a rhetorical question. Some of you voters evidently support a thoroughly discredited economic theory that promises to burn the social safety net designed to save you from personal catastrophe, and I want to know why.

Now I have a question. Examination of the very-limited information we have about Mitt Romney's taxes show that if Paul Ryan's budget were adopted, his tax rate would drop from 13.9% to 0.82%. It's effectively the same supply-side economic theory that has famously failed to produce results for the poor and middle class for ten years now, combined with the same sort of austerity measures that have produced such catastrophic results across Europe in the last few years. By comparison, the top marginal tax rate in the United States was upwards of 70% from 1936 through 1982, and instead of the broad-spectrum Randian capitalist collapse Conservatives tell us that tax hikes should inspire, the country built its way out of the Great Depression to become a global superpower and the envy of the industrialized world.

When all the evidence points to the fact that the Romney / Ryan budget will take from the poor, give to the rich, and fuel a pro-cyclical economic spiral by pursuing thoroughly discredited economic theories, why should average Americans support it?

This was not a rhetorical question. Some of you voters evidently support a thoroughly discredited economic theory that promises to burn the social safety net designed to save you from personal catastrophe, and I want to know why.

I'm middle class and personally feel it is a positive that Romney makes so much money. He did it on his own and his business experience eclipses this idiot in office now.

You Obama supporters should start getting a little nervous IMHO, I sense the momentum has shifted. I know it will still be close, but am optimistic that the country as a whole won't reelect him and his fool.

No, he didn't. No one does it on their own. Everyone, every. single. person. has at some point received help from others and/or benefited from government.

If, at any point in time, he ran a small business, he likely benefited from the SBA. Banks pretty much won't lend without an SBA guarantee (which covers 50-75% of the loan). If he's ever purchased a home less than 417K (big if) it was backed by GSEs. If he ever drives on a road, it's because a government has paved it. The colleges he went to have received federal money. At some point, he's had employees. All of them have contributed to his success. Nothing in this world is a wholly singular effort.

Whether you like it or not, we're all in this together. We need less people thinking 'I did this on my own, suckers!' and more people acknowledging the help they get every single day to get to where they are.

Romney pitched fiscal conservatism, insisted he supported Roe v. Wade, and let his campaign hand out flyers at a gay pride parade. In doing so, he tapped into a comfort zone with voters that helped a series of Republican candidates win the governor's office.

Unlike his predecessors, Romney also attempted the thankless task of trying to rebuild the state's Republican Party, a feeble institution built on "chicken wire and duct tape," as longtime Democrat and onetime Boston City Councilor Michael McCormack puts it. To further the GOP cause in Massachusetts, Romney recruited more than 100 candidates to challenge Democratic lawmakers. When all those Republican candidates lost, Romney declared, "From now on, it's me-me-me." And from then on, it was.

He proposed health care reform legislation because he believed it would bolster his national ambitions. For the same reason, he made a hard right turn on social issues. As he fought for credibility with Republican primary voters, he abandoned the middle ground on wedge issues like immigration and walked away from the health care reform act that Bay State Democrats still consider his major accomplishment.

As a presidential candidate, Romney is unpopular in Massachusetts. According to the Real Clear Politics polling average, President Obama leads Romney by 18 points in the Bay State. Compare that with polling data for Republican Senator Scott Brown, whose race with Democrat Elizabeth Warren is considered a toss-up.

I find it hard to believe any sane person would vote for Obama/Biden again.

I have a lot of democrat elderly clients that bought all the change bullshit they shoveled the first time, and they will not be voting for him again. In fact, every democrat client I have that has brought up the election is adamant that we have to get this asshat out of office.

I find it hard to believe any sane person would vote for Obama/Biden again.

I have a lot of democrat elderly clients that bought all the change bullshit they shoveled the first time, and they will not be voting for him again. In fact, every democrat client I have that has brought up the election is adamant that we have to get this asshat out of office.

Not that all that matters much as TN is going Romney regardless.

The funny thing is I thought the same thing about GW and look what happened there. Granted Romney is leaps and bounds better than Kerry, but still who in their right mind would have voted for GW the second term. I mean look at the state of the country by 2008. But he won, so anything is possible when it comes to politics.

Logged

" And they are a strong and frightening force, impervious to, and immunized against, the feeble lance of mere reason." Isaac Asimov

If Romney's turn as governor taught us anything, it's that Mitt Romney will adopt whatever positions will put Mitt Romney in power. Choosing Paul Ryan (on topic!) is just another example of embracing the policies that he believes will improve his shot at the brass ring.

It's too bad the rest of the country is determined to ignore the MA experience that's the only relevant thing on Mitt's resume. It will be a pity if they have to learn that themselves the hard way.

Sure, Obama is conciliatory to the point of spinelessness, but at least he consistently stands for something, however ineffectively. Romney is a cipher who's been on both sides of every issue. Does he believe in anything besides himself? You're going to have to elect him to find out. The only thing I know for sure is that Mitt Romney believes that Mitt Romney should be president. If he actually grabs the brass ring, who knows? Maybe he'll dutifully believe whatever his biggest donors paid him to believe, or maybe we'll actually see the real Romney for the first time in his sketchy political career.

Quote from: Eco-Logic on August 23, 2012, 07:25:30 PM

I find it hard to believe any sane person would vote for Obama/Biden again.

Because I live in one of the 42 states that don't matter, I have the luxury of voting my conscience. I will be filling in the oval for Jill Stein...who is, ironrodically enough, the same candidate that I supported when Romney ran for governor. And I'll take this opportunity to exhort everybody who doesn't live in a swing state not to throw your vote away on one of the major party candidates -- instead go socialist with Stein or anarchist with that libertarian fellow, whatever his name is.

I don't understand what part of Romney's pledge to cut taxes on the 1% and broaden the tax base (i.e. raise taxes on everyone else) is supposed to be appealing to me. But I am willing to learn. If only someone could explain why I should feel good about that?

Logged

A Pew Research Center poll found nearly half of Americans hold the false belief that TARP was passed under President Obama, while only 34 percent know it originated under Bush."Oh yeah?" Bush replied. "50% of the people were wrong."